The present technology relates to an image processing method, an encoding device, a decoding device, and an image processing apparatus suitable for processing of high-speed images taken by a high-speed camera, for example.
In order to achieve reproduction of images in slow motion, a high-speed camera has recently appeared in the market, which is capable of imaging at a high frame rate of several hundreds to several thousands of frames per second, which is much higher than the frame rate of an ordinary camera (24 or 30 frames per second).
As an example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2010-278481 (hereinafter, referred to as Patent Document 1) describes the technology about a data processing apparatus that is capable of capturing high-speed video taken by a high-speed camera, performing signal processing thereon, and reproducing the video in slow motion. The data processing apparatus of Patent Document 1 divides the high-speed video taken by the high-speed camera on an n-frame basis, and stores the resulting frames into a data storage means. The data processing apparatus reads the frames from the data storage means, compresses and encodes the frames, and records the frames onto the data storage means as stream data. The stream data recorded on the data storage means is decoded by a decoding means in the data processing apparatus, and then is supplied to a display device for display thereon. With the data processing apparatus of Patent Document 1 as such, described is the effect of not using a high-performance processing means because a camera output signal is processed on the independent frame basis unlike the case of performing a series of processes on a directly-received camera output signal.